Timiditas et Deditio

Andrew, Andy and Mark on Yale’s shameful, cowardly capitulation.

In Mr. Aslan’s view no danger remains. “The controversy has died out now, anyone who wants to see them can see them,” he said of the cartoons, noting that he has written and lectured extensively about the incident and shown the cartoons without any negative reaction. He added that none of the violence occurred in the United States: “There were people who were annoyed, and what kind of publishing house doesn’t publish something that annoys some people?”

“This is an academic book for an academic audience by an academic press,” he continued. “There is no chance of this book having a global audience, let alone causing a global outcry.” He added, “It’s not just academic cowardice, it is just silly and unnecessary.”

Remember: Multiculturalism kills.

Update:

It’s even worse than that.

As reported in the Guardian, Sheila Blair, a professor of Islamic and Asian art at Norma Jean Calderwood University, has acknowledged being among the experts consulted by Yale, and she “strongly urged” YUP to publish the images in the book. What’s more, she has written a letter to the Times, explaining her reasoning:  “To deny that such images were made is to distort the historical record and to bow to the biased view of some modern zealots who would deny that others at other times and places perceived and illustrated Muhammad in different ways.”

No Leg to Stand On

This Messiah, the one my coworker called “F***ing brilliant” has, once again, shown his scissor-like grasp of the facts.

—  Yesterday during a town hall meeting, President Obama got his facts completely wrong. He stated that a surgeon gets paid $50,000 for a leg amputation when, in fact, Medicare pays a surgeon between $740 and $1,140 for a leg amputation.  This payment also includes the evaluation of the patient on the day of the operation plus patient follow-up care that is provided for 90 days after the operation.  Private insurers pay some variation of the Medicare reimbursement for this service.

—  Three weeks ago, the President suggested that a surgeon’s decision to remove a child’s tonsils is based on the desire to make a lot of money. That remark was ill-informed and dangerous, and we were dismayed by this characterization of the work surgeons do.  Surgeons make decisions about recommending operations based on what’s right for the patient.

A little earned hyperbole

There are some hyperbolic statements in the voiceover. But, really, it is pretty amazing.

Unbelievable

When people call Fox News “right wing” it really only means they aren’t quite as liberal as most of the government-run media. I mean, any network that hires Geraldo Rivera can’t be very far to the right.

The thing to remember about TV “news” is that they’re all incompetent boobs. Here is Glenn Beck and some newsbabe going off half cocked about a TOS agreement on the cars.com web site.

Oh, for crying out loud, Glenn. That agreement applies only to the car dealerships because the site is not intended for the consumers. Is the “Cash for Clunkers” program a pile of crap? Of course. Is it going to let the Feds into your house? Get real.

Fascism 101

What with both Rush Limbaugh and Nancy Pelosi irresponsibly tossing around the Nazi label, Cliff May provides a welcome reminder of what, and who, the fascists really are.

Maybe something useful can come of this brouhaha: a chance to understand a little more about Nazism and other varieties of fascism, how they’ve threatened us in the past, and the form that threat has taken on in the present. Michael Ledeen, now the Freedom Scholar at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, spent many years studying fascism. He was perhaps the first to describe the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, leader of Iran’s Islamic Revolution in 1979, as a “clerical fascist.” With that in mind, consider:

Nazism was supremacist. Hitler preached that Germans and Aryans were a master race, born to rule the world. Militant Islamists — whether Shiite (like Khomeini) or Sunni (like Osama bin Laden) — also are supremacist, though they substitute religion for race, the “Nation of Islam” for the German nation. They claim Muslims — led by them — have a divine right to rule.

The Nazis believed their triumph would come through a glorious war. The Islamists believe their triumph will come through a glorious holy war — a jihad against infidels and the West.

The Nazis believed that only men, not women, are fit to lead and wield power. The Islamists concur.

Touchy?

This is the woman who aired the 3AM phone call spots?

A Sweet John Hughes Story

Time to decompress from the willfully ignorant and read a nice story about a nice guy who is gone too soon.

John told me about why he left Hollywood just a few years earlier. He was terrified of the impact it was having on his sons; he was scared it was going to cause them to lose perspective on what was important and what happiness meant. And he told me a sad story about how, a big reason behind his decision to give it all up was that “they” (Hollywood) had “killed” his friend, John Candy, by greedily working him too hard.

Let’s Play Spot the Despot

From a tender age I noticed that tyrannical despots could be spotted because they hung giant portraits of themselves everywhere.

Coming in a close second were those who had their personal logos.

What, then to make of this?

Once again, He is fortunate His last name is not Bush. Imagine the outrage if he had plastered a version of his campaign logo on some pet legislation. We’d still be hearing about it.

Speaking of artwork, this is cropping up all over St. Louis:

Dawkins vs. Wright

I may have some disagreements with Richard Dawkins, but these videos prove that he’s a better man than I am. I could not have remained so calm and civil in the face of such lunacy. This woman is so set in her ideology that she won’t, or perhaps can’t, let any evidence in. She’s a textbook case of how not to think.

If you’ve the stomach for it, here’s more: Wherein Dawkins repeatedly presents the evidence and she continues to insist there isn’t any.

It’s frightening to think I share the road with these people.

If MSNBC Were an Actual News Organization

somebody there would be truly embarrassed by this.

I’ve never seen this moron meat puppet before, but he really takes the cake. Is this kind of idiotic, schoolyard bullying is what the Left thinks it’ll take to cram Obamacare down our throats?

Meanwhile, this Peter Schiff sounds like someone to back. I hope he clobbers Dodd.

Miss Information

This Linda Douglass is a breathtaking liar. I can’t believe that she’s getting such a hard time on CNN, of all places. Notice how she makes assertion after assertion and doesn’t waste time mentioning facts. She’s the Queen of the non-rebuttal rebuttal. Or, as a commenter to Byron York put it, Miss Information.

I often wonder just how stupid Dear Leader and his minions think we are. Since He did, after all, win the election, it must be really stupid.

Image courtesy of sublog:

Astrology with Needles

An absolutely fascinating article at SBM on the real history of Accupuncture. The form known today is anything but ancient, but it does go back to astrology and bloodletting.

Acupuncture is presumed to have its origins in blood ritual, magic tattooing and body piercing associated with Neolithic healing practices. The Neolithic origin hypothesis is supported by the presence of nonfigurative tattoos on the Tyrolean Ice Man–an inhabitant of the Oetztal Alps in Europe–whose naturally preserved 5,200-year-old body displays a set of small cross-shaped tattoos that are located significantly proximal to classical acupuncture points. Medical imaging shows that the middle-aged man suffered from lumbar arthrosis and the cross-shaped tattoos are located at points traditionally indicated for this condition. Similar nonfigurative tattoos and evidence of therapeutic tattooing, lancing and blood ritual have been found throughout the Ancient world, including the Americas. Health-related tattoos are still prevalent in Tibet, where specific points on the body are needled with a blend of medicinal herbs in the dyes. These practices appear to be largely intended to maintain balance with the natural and spiritual worlds, and also to protect against demonic infestation and malevolence. Seemingly, this Neolithic and Bronze Age lancing heritage, which was intertwined with magic and animism has evolved in various cultures into codified systems of lancing and venesection for assuring good health and longevity. In addition to treating the impurity or superabundance of blood, in various cultures lancing was also believed to affect the flow of a numinous life-force that is, for instance, called qi (or chi, 氣, pronounced “chee”) in Chinese, prāna (प्राण) in Sanskrit, pneuma (πνεύμα) in Greek, etc. In many instances, elements of metaphysics, mythology, mysticism, magic, shamanism, exorcism, astrology and empirical medicine intimately intertwined, making it difficult for modern scholars to interpret them as mutually exclusive categories.

As a bonus, Steven Novella has a post on how to recognize and avoid quack clinics.

Building Walt’s Dream

Enjoy some great, rare footage of the construction of Disneyland.

The Thing from Sacramento

There’s a memorable line in John Carpenter’s classic remake of The Thing, when Palmer (David Clennon) watches a severed, upside-down human head sprout legs and scuttle across the floor: “You’ve got to be f****ing kidding me.”

That’s pretty much my reaction to this.

California’s budget woes have resulted in the state “paying” a number of its vendors with IOU’s.  That’s a bad enough situation as these businesses who have already provided the goods and/or services purchased to the government have to keep paying their bills (and not with IOU’s), but now the state wants them to pay taxes on the IOU’s they’ve received as if they were income.

The September Issue

Back when The Devil Wears Prada was picking up Oscar nominations left and right I wondered why. It didn’t seem like that kind of movie. But, then, I hadn’t seen it. A few weeks ago we studied it in a film analysis class at Pixar University.  I learned that it was a very well-written and crafted film, completely deserving of the nominations.

So when it was announced that we’d have a chance to see The September Issue at work I looked up the trailer. I could see that the Prada production designers had done their homework and, already being intrigued by some of the personalities, really wanted to see it.

R.J. Cutler presented it to a packed house in our screening room the other day. The movie far, far exceeded my expectations. This is an engrossing, highly entertaining film about some fascinating characters, especially Anna Wintour and Grace Coddington. The beautiful verité photography by Bob Richman provides some wonderfully observed moments, and his presence in the film has a wonderful payoff near the end.

Wintour comes off simultaneously as a scary force of nature and a really confident woman who simply knows what she wants. There are moments, such as when a photographer on an expensive European shoot delivers a paltry set of photos (and none at all from one location), when she has every right to be angry.

Coddington nearly steals the show. She’s the one person who can go mano a mano with Wintour, and just radiates both her considerable talent and the fact that she’s clearly comfortable with herself. Cutler said it took over half of his 8-month shooting schedule to win her confidence, but it pays off with cinematic gold.

Many people (I’m one) hear the word “documentary” and start to glaze over. Don’t. This movie had us laughing from the get-go, and is surprisingly touching. Wonderfully edited, it’s got a solid three acts and larger than life characters.

In fact, it’s a riot to find that Stanley Tucci’s character in Prada was toned down – waaaaay down – from real life. Let’s just say you’ll see someone who puts the boy in flamboyant.

If brain-dead summer films have you down, The September Issue, rolling out this August and September, could well be the cure. And no, you do not have to have any interest at all in fashion to enjoy it.

Remember when protest was patriotic?

I’m old enough to recall those days of long ago, those days of yore, those days before last November.

Remember:  When lefties do it, it’s called “community organizing.” When conservatives and libertarians do it, it’s “astroturf.” But some people are noticing the truth.   As Mickey Kaus notes, “If an ‘astroturfing’ campaign gets real people to show up at events stating their real views, isn’t it … community organizing?”  Why yes, yes it is.

The Two-Faced Messiah

Allapundit links to a video that will remind you why the mayor in The Nightmare Before Christmas literally had two faces. For somebody who is supposed to be The One, He sure talks like two.

I’m really ready for Him to start a speech with, “They pull a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue.” Remember where He came from. He is really acting the part now.

Rant OTD

The Old Jarhead is tired.

I’ll be 63 soon. Except for one semester in college when jobs were scarce, and a six-month period when I was between jobs, but job-hunting every day, I’ve worked, hard, since I was 18. Despite some health challenges, I still put in 50-hour weeks, and haven’t called in sick in seven or eight years. I make a good salary, but I didn’t inherit my job or my income, and I worked to get where I am. Given the economy, there’s no retirement in sight, and I’m tired. Very tired.

I think he’d be disappointed in Condi Rice, and I have a few other quibbles but, for the most part, he nails it.

Angry Mob of Racists Beats Black Man at Town Hall

“It’s every Democrat talking point you’ve read about in the last day or two…”

With a twist.

I guess the Democrats were right after all. At a town meeting held by a Democrat congressman, a rowdy group of organized and angry thugs showed up to make a point about ObamaCare, and then beat up a man. Race was involved, too: the victim was black — attacked by a man yelling racial slurs.

Update:

Note to union thugs: Always wear your official tee shirt. Not only does it guarantee you entrance into the Town Hall meeting, but it makes you easy to identify in the video of your assault.

Is The One Really Like the Joker?

See a resemblance?

Not so fast.

[T]he Joker seemed chaotic but was very careful in his planning, while the chaos from the Obama administration seems much more explainable by pure incompetence.

Time to Quit the AARP

I’m not a member, and never will be. Now that it has unmasked as the hard-left organization that it is, some AARP members are canceling their memberships.

I hope that all AARP members cancel. And ask for a refund.

Mob. Yeah, right.

The Omnivore’s Delusion

Next time some tiresome lib starts whining about how much “better” organic food is, or about how “evil” so-called industrial farming is, shove this article in front of him, her or it.

I’m so tired of people who wouldn’t visit a doctor who used a stethoscope instead of an MRI demanding that farmers like me use 1930s technology to raise food. Farming has always been messy and painful, and bloody and dirty. It still is.

But now we have to listen to self-appointed experts on airplanes frightening their seatmates about the profession I have practiced for more than 30 years. I’d had enough. I turned around and politely told the lecturer that he ought not believe everything he reads. He quieted and asked me what kind of farming I do. I told him, and when he asked if I used organic farming, I said no, and left it at that. I didn’t answer with the first thought that came to mind, which is simply this: I deal in the real world, not superstitions, and unless the consumer absolutely forces my hand, I am about as likely to adopt organic methods as the Wall Street Journal is to publish their next edition by setting the type by hand.

Young turkeys aren’t smart enough to come in out of the rain, and will stand outside in a downpour, with beaks open and eyes skyward, until they drown.
He was a businessman, and I’m sure spends his days with spreadsheets, projections, and marketing studies. He hasn’t used a slide rule in his career and wouldn’t make projections with tea leaves or soothsayers. He does not blame witchcraft for a bad quarter, or expect the factory that makes his product to use steam power instead of electricity, or horses and wagons to deliver his products instead of trucks and trains. But he expects me to farm like my grandfather, and not incidentally, I suppose, to live like him as well. He thinks farmers are too stupid to farm sustainably, too cruel to treat their animals well, and too careless to worry about their communities, their health, and their families. I would not presume to criticize his car, or the size of his house, or the way he runs his business. But he is an expert about me, on the strength of one book, and is sharing that expertise with captive audiences every time he gets the chance. Enough, enough, enough.

And read the whole thing y0urself.

The Critic

And now, it’s time for some culture. We all need to be familiar with the classics.

What’s going on in Afghanistan?

As was the case with Iraq a couple of years ago, if you really want to know you ignore the Government-Run Media and read the dispatches from Michael Yon. In this one he gets images of a helicopter stirring up its own electrical storm – something I’ve never seen before.

The slow shutter speed makes the moving chopper vanish, but reveals the static discharges.

I’m Feeling Fishy

Can you imagine the furor if the Bush White House had posted anything like this on its web site?

There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

Neal Boortz has an idea what to do with this outrage. Report offenders!

I invite … no, I URGE you to refer the White House to today’s Nealz Nuze. In fact, do it every single day.

Another idea. Take the web address for Linda Douglass’ little speech and send IT to the White House. You can hardly sound more fishy than that.

Let me jump on that bandwagon. Feel free to report this blog as being fishy, too.

Update:

A lesson I keep learning over and over again: No matter what I do here, Iowahawk is going to do it better.

Greetings citizen! By now you may have heard scattered rumors of state and party officials encountering reactionary resistors at local health care reform information programs. Do not be alarmed, for our 5-year plan for citizen health proceeds without delay. Remain stalwart! The truth can be told at last, that these so-called “protests” are merely the desperate rear flank mob actions of dead-end bandits and saboteurs in the pay of enemy insurance agents.

Read the whole thing. Then watch this.

Clunker

Gaming the system is the system.

And so I asked the question on the minds of millions of my fellow concerned citizens: How can I get my snout into this trough? Easy: I buy a small car qualifying for the $4,500, and keep it for a few months until the cash-for-clunkers boondoggle has run its course. At that point, the supply of used cars will have shrunk and their prices driven up; I will sell the almost-new small car for what I paid for it ($12,629 last Saturday) or more, at worst having driven it for free, and then buy the truck I covet.

The consequences of trashing all those “clunkers” will fall mostly on the poor, but also on auto parts and service businesses.

The definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over while expecting different results.

Socialism doesn’t work. Why do these crazy people keep trying it?

Next time you meet a Global Warming Alarmist

ask them why they haven’t just killed themselves. If you really, truly believe this stuff then you believe that humans are the problem.

The most recent example of anti-birth thinking comes from Paul Murtaugh and Michael Schlax of Oregon State University. In a study called “Reproduction and the carbon legacies of individuals,” they suggest that if you truly care about the environment, it’s not enough to trade your SUV for a Prius, use the right lightbulbs, or limit your lawn to organic fertilizers. To the contrary, you need to start thinking about something way more important: i.e., having one less child.

The “basic premise,” the study reports, is that “a person is responsible for emissions of his descendents.”

Why stop at merely preventing American or English births? Just think of the carbon reduction you could make by just offing yourself.

I think there are many who want the political outcome of anthropogenic alarmism. I don’t think there are many, if any, true believers.

Update:

The scientific debate, meanwhile is just getting interesting. Go ahead and skim past Watts’ objections to ground temperature stations. I’m sure many are as bad as he claims, but those data aren’t (or shouldn’t be) particularly relevant. The satellite data are much better and, as you’ll see, are less “convenient”.

Satellite observations are not influenced by heat islands or subject to the quality control problems detailed by Watts, and satellite records tally well with weather balloon observations–an independent database. However, the “debate is over” crowd is unlikely to embrace this solution.  The satellite record shows a relatively slow rate of warming–about 0.13ºC per decade–hence a relatively insensitive climate.

It’s a nice roundup. Worth perusing.

I Cook, Therefore I Am

Take time to enjoy Out of the Kitchen, Onto the Couch and ponder the many benefits of cooking.

Cutler and his colleagues also surveyed cooking patterns across several cultures and found that obesity rates are inversely correlated with the amount of time spent on food preparation. The more time a nation devotes to food preparation at home, the lower its rate of obesity. In fact, the amount of time spent cooking predicts obesity rates more reliably than female participation in the labor force or income. Other research supports the idea that cooking is a better predictor of a healthful diet than social class: a 1992 study in The Journal of the American Dietetic Association found that poor women who routinely cooked were more likely to eat a more healthful diet than well-to-do women who did not.

And then go whip up a nice meal.

(Tonight I’m making pesto rotelle with portobello mushroom.)

The Messiah (Uncut)

Remember: “Single Payer” in English means socialized medicine.

The White House response is beyond lame. Anyone with kindergarten-level critical thinking skills can see she’s tilting at strawmen, obfuscating, and outright lying. Just in case, though, here is The One with no edits.

Transcript courtesy Breitbart TV:

“I happen to be a proponent of a single payer universal health care program. I see no reason why the United States of America, the wealthiest country in the history of the world, spending 14 percent of its Gross National Product on health care cannot provide basic health insurance to everybody. And that’s what Jim is talking about when he says everybody in, nobody out. A single payer health care plan, a universal health care plan. And that’s what I’d like to see. But as all of you know, we may not get there immediately. Because first we have to take back the White House, we have to take back the Senate, and we have to take back the House.”

Bring on the ridicule, Barry.

The Natives Are Restless

Check out the three videos at Hot Air which illustrate why Obamacare is in trouble.

More hostility, please.

I just checked my misrepresentative’s web site and not only does she not seem to have any public meetings scheduled, but “health care” doesn’t make it onto her “hot topics” list. Oh, but the switch to digital TV does.